Miss Heap became more and more alert as they approached the bend in the lane round which the Twist house was situated.  She had been there before, making a point of getting a friend to motor her past it in order to see what she could for herself, but Mr. Ridding, in spite of his desire to go and have a look too, had always, each time he tried to, found Mrs. Ridding barring the way.  So that he didn’t exactly know where it was; and when on turning the corner the car suddenly stopped, and putting his head out—­he was sitting backwards—–­ he saw a great, old-fashioned signboard, such as he was accustomed to in pictures of ancient English village greens, with

     The Open Arms

in medieval letters painted on it, all he said was, “Guess we’ve run it to earth.”

Miss Heap sat with her hands in her lap, staring.  Mrs. Ridding, her mind blocked by aspic, wasn’t receiving impressions.  She gazed with heavy eyes straight in front of her.  There she saw cars.  Many cars.  All stopped at this particular spot.  With a dull sensation of fathomless fatigue she dimly wondered at them.

“Looks as though it’s a hostelry,” said Mr. Ridding, who remembered his Dickens; and he blinked up, craning his head out, at the signboard, on which through a gap in the branches of the pepper trees a shaft of brilliant late afternoon sun was striking.  “Don’t see one, though.”

He jerked his thumb.  “Up back of the trees there, I reckon,” he said.

Then he prepared to open the door and go and have a look.

A hand shot out of Miss Heap’s lap at him.  “Don’t,” she said quickly. 
“Don’t, Mr. Ridding.”

There was a little green gate in the thick hedge that grew behind the pepper trees, and some people he knew, who had been in the car in front, were walking up to it.  Some other people he knew had already got to it, and were standing talking together with what looked like leaflets in their hands.  These leaflets came out of a green wooden box fastened on to one of the gate-posts, with the words Won’t you take one? painted on it.

Mr. Ridding naturally wanted to go and take one, and here was Miss Heap laying hold of him and saying “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” he asked looking down at her, his hand on the door.

“Hello Ridding,” called out one of the people he knew.  “No good getting out.  Show doesn’t open till to-morrow at four.  Can’t get in to-day.  Gate’s bolted.  Nothing doing.”

And then the man detached himself from the group at the gate and came over to the car with a leaflet in his hand.

“Say—­” he said,—­“how are you to-day, Miss Heap?  Mrs. Ridding, your humble servant—­say, look at this.  Teapot Twist wasn’t born yesterday when it comes to keeping things dark.  No mention of his name on this book of words, but it’s the house he was doing up all right, and it is to be used as an inn.  Afternoon-tea inn.  Profits to go to the American Red Cross.  Price per head five dollars.  Bit stiff, five dollars for tea.  Wonder where those Twinkler girls come in.  Here—­you have this, Ridding, and study it.  I’ll get another.”  And taking off his hat a second time to the ladies he went back to his friends.